Jan. 22 – Bruce Davis was found suitable for parole at his 33rd hearing, held today at San Quentin State Prison. This is Davis’ seventh parole recommendation.
Davis, 78, is serving a life term for his role in the 1969 murders of Gary Hinman and Donald “Shorty” Shea.
Davis was tried in late 1971. After a four month trial, Davis was convicted of two counts of First Degree Murder and one count of Conspiracy to Commit Murder and Robbery. He was sentenced to seven years to life.
Davis has been incarcerated since April 21, 1972. He has been a model prisoner with only two rule infractions in nearly five decades of incarceration, the last occurring in 1980. He received a Master’s degree from Borean School of the Bible and a Doctorate degree in philosophy and religion from Bethany Seminary. While incarcerated Davis has married, fathered a child and divorced.
Davis has been denied parole 26 times since becoming eligible in 1977. He was first recommended for parole in 2010. The decision was reversed by then governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. He has subsequently been recommended for parole in 2012, 2014, 2015, 2017 and 2019. Former governor Jerry Brown reversed his parole four times and Gavin Newsom has reversed his parole once.
Due to COVID-19, today’s decision will undergo an expedited review by the Board of Parole Hearings. Then it will be reviewed by Governor Gavin Newsom, who will either confirm, reverse or modify the parole grant. The decision will be finalized no later than June 21st.
It’s that time again. Groundhog Day & Deja Vu all over again. Parole boards make the same determinations and so do governors. Wash, rinse, repeat. What a waste of time.
Does Davis have a place to go? He’s 78 and would probably have a tough time finding a job or a place to live even before Covid made things worse.
Now that Governor Gavin “Hairdo” Newsom finds himself the subject of a recall petition (which currently has over a million signatures), there is no way in the world that he will release Davis or anyone else connected to Manson.
Please governor don’t allow the release of any of these hooligans. They took life they deserve life in prison.
The governor isn’t going away Biggie! A million people in California is like ten people. To bad so sad!
FREE BRUCE DAVIS!
DxCX, Is that by any chance a reference to the “Free George Davis” campaign in London during the 70s? It worked for George. I fear it won’t for Bruce.
Biggie- thank goodness! But realistically I doubt someone his age would be able to adjust to the outside world at this late date.
Well well, so Brucie is up for parole again. All those murderous racist hooligans all deserve to die in prison. Here they were thinking their ignorant behinds were superior and going to rule the world. Comical! With their filthy lifestyle, they weren’t even superior to dogs and rats. I hope the Governor keeps him right where he is. They showed no mercy so they don’t deserve any now.
Its not about showing mercy, its about following the parole boards recommendations. The parole board is trained to do this and only they seem to understand how to follow parole rules. If the governor can over ride parole recommendations, what’s the purpose of parole boards then?
There are many people that have committed murder and have been paroled within 25-30 years. Murder is murder, no murder is worse than another, victims died period. The only reason they’re being denied is because they were Manson followers period. Had the media not made them so famous, no one would still be talking about these murders 50+ years later. They’re still making new movies about the horror of these killings.
Many other murders that were just as gruesome have been long forgotten and the killers have been paroled in many cases. So why should every Manson family member still be in prison?
I agree that Krenwinkle and Watson should remain in prison forever due to their huge part in both nights of slaughter. But Bruce and Leslie should have been paroled at least 20 years ago. Both have done everything right and worked hard at turning themselves around, just like the parole board told them too. Prison should be about rehabilitation along with punishment. If this isn’t followed like it should be we will need hundreds more prisons at the tax payers expense.
I realize they took lives and those lives will never come back and never should have been taken. But at a certain point you need to move past the horror and do what’s right. Bruce and Leslie are now both political prisoners and that shouldn’t happen here in America.
Political prisoners but also murderers. Quite frankly it’s not that some murderers get out in 25 years, I think depending on the crime some maybe should never get out.
I don’t know about other “gruesome” crimes except for OJ’s and he got off. The justice system is not perfect. In some states the death penalty is allowed and some also allow the Governor to have the last word. He is often swayed by public opinion.
So if people want changes then I guess they have to change the system. Judging from what’s been going on in America lately a lot of things have happened that shouldn’t have.
Bruce Davis was involved in two, not one, murders. By all counts two innocent people. He can not get out.
EMH, Bruce Davis has not had a perfect record in prison. Just because they claim to have found God and be religious now, doesn’t mean they’re good to be released back into society now. They were easily led once and could be again because they couldn’t think for themselves.
I don’t consider Bruce or Leslie political prisoners. The board does get to consider the heinous nature of the crimes. I honestly don’t understand how their sentence went from Death to Life with parole. It should have been life WITHOUT parole to begin with.
I highly doubt any Manson follower will ever be released. Susan Atkins went to her last parole hearing with a brain tumor and only a few months to live, on a gurney with an amputated leg and they STILL said she posed an unreasonable risk and denied her parole. If that’s not proof right there that none of them are getting released, I don’t know what is.
Echo says:
Bruce Davis has not had a perfect record in prison
Sure, he’s had 2 infractions, neither serious and the last one was in 1980 ! 40 years ago !!
Methinks thou art clutcheth at ye olde straws. 😇
Just because they claim to have found God and be religious now, doesn’t mean they’re good to be released back into society now
Some might be surprised to find that as a Christian, I agree with that.
Let me preface that however, by saying that Bruce was actually the first of the Family to make the move to Christ, in 1973. He did so before Charles Watson, Susan Atkins {in fact, he helped her in that way}, Dennis Rice, Catherine Share and Dianne Lake. He also was the one Family member who wasn’t sentenced to death in that initial spate of murder trials. So his sentence was always life with the possibility of parole. That alone tells you that the law did not take his involvement in the murders of Gary Hinman {he wasn’t even there} and Shorty Shea as seriously either as the others involved in TLB or even as seriously as that of Steve Grogan, who was sentenced to death for Shorty’s murder before the judge commuted it to life.
So Bruce, right from the start, at least judicially, was in a different camp to the others.
That all said, the claim to have found God isn’t something one just whips up one day……and keeps going for 47 years. Most people that comment on the likes of Bruce do so from the vantage point of 1969/70/71. True, Manson himself barely changed from that time to his death in 2017 but that has nothing to do with Bruce Davis’ beliefs.
Even if a person has been forgiven by and transformed by God, their initial crime might still be heinous enough to merit much further time in prison. After all, they are truly free, a lot freer than many people on the outside that refuse to go God’s way and give themselves over to be transformed by the almighty. Jail might actually be the most effective place for God to carry on his transforming work and fill them with his mind boggling love. It’s a lifetime work. He’s been with God for most of his life.
The irony, at least from a serious Christian perspective, is that Bruce is on a win~win. If he gets out, he might have a few years of earthly independence and if he doesn’t, as long as he’s been straight up with his Lord, he has eternity with Christ to content himself with.
They were easily led once and could be again because they couldn’t think for themselves
That was in 1967, 68, 69. I remember those years. I was a little kid but I have very distinct memories of them. It was more than half a century ago. It is undoubtedly true that some people remain like that throughout their entire lives. But it equally true that many more learn from their errors, especially if it’s landed them in jail for half a century, included the loss of life and the lamentation of a wasted life that has left much debris in its short wake.
Sometimes, it’s drastic measures that enable a person to wake up, whether in jail or out.
I do dispute with you however that they couldn’t think for themselves. They most certainly could. They chose to align their thinking with the counterculture around them {as did the Beatles and many, many others at the time} and with Charlie in particular. It’s no different to what possibly most, certainly many people, probably yourself included, do. It’s human to do that. That we could all go drastically wrong is one of the risks of agreeing with someone or some philosophy that ultimately goes wrong first.
I honestly don’t understand how their sentence went from Death to Life with parole. It should have been life WITHOUT parole to begin with
At the time such a sentence as LWOP didn’t exist. And even if it had by 1972, it didn’t at the time of the crime and any commuting of the death sentence had to take into account what existed at the time. If LWOP had existed at the time I have no doubt that all of the Family killers would have had their sentences commuted to that and few would have argued with it.
I highly doubt any Manson follower will ever be released
Many on all sides of the argument do ~ but for interestingly different reasons. At least on the surface they appear to be different. When it boils down to it, I suspect that there are those on all sides of the argument that believe that it’s a done deal before the hearings ever take place. Some say “We don’t care if the law is bent or perverted, whatever it takes to keep that scum inside” and some on the opposing end say, “the law is being bent and perverted to keep them inside” ~ which ends up being the same thing at the end of the day !
Susan Atkins went to her last parole hearing with a brain tumor and only a few months to live, on a gurney with an amputated leg and they STILL said she posed an unreasonable risk and denied her parole
A few things have changed in the intervening period though. Firstly, 2009 was, even by our standards, a long time ago. And Atkins went into her last two hearings not agreeing with the court record. She insisted that she had not stabbed Sharon Tate and in fact had made big speeches about it at hearings a few times even though the court record stated she had ~ and during her trial she had not only admitted it, she’d gloried in it. Now, we know why she did that but it in effect left her in no man’s land because it appeared that she was saying that the court got it wrong. That is why she was deemed to have posed an unreasonable risk. It was almost tantamount to her denying her guilt. It was the catch 22’s catch 22 ! Her situation is remarkably similar to that of Tex and Pat who are pretty much always going to find it next to impossible to explain how they went from docile peacenicks to murder in the space of a couple of hours, whereas Leslie doesn’t have that problem. She freely admits that she wanted to kill. And she’s able to provide a context that, while it has fantastic elements, is easily traceable and believable {unless you’re the Guv’nor that has made up their mind beforehand that you’re going to block the parole board’s recommendation}.
In a way, given Atkins’ condition as she was dying, her whereabouts/location made scant difference so the decision wasn’t really as cruel as it seems on the surface. It’s not as though she could appreciate her surroundings. As Vincent Bugliosi put it “she’s not going to be going to Disneyland….”
Political prisoners? No, murders. Plain & simple….
Fred,
well, I can’t argue with anyone’s religious belief. I can only say a lot of people “find the Lord” in prison but it would be interesting to see if that carries on once they are released. I personally know of one person, a neighbours son, where it didn’t carry on in their free life and they ended up back in prison- and praising the Lord again. I don’t think God transforms our lives – only we can do that if we want it badly enough, and/or to have a relationship with the Divine. We are all human and imperfect. Some of us need ongoing therapy too.
No one can speak for another’s soul I fear and I’m glad to hear you say that that born again isn’t a get out of jail free card.
PS: Fred, as for Susan Atkins, if there were any of them to feel sorry for, compared to the other girls she had experiences a very dysfuntional early life. Even as a Christian I believe she was so messed up mentally that no one could say for sure if she would be ok once released for all her claiming Christ as her lord and saviour. For some reason many people find that very distasteful, people who held human life in such disregard now suddenly Children of God. It’s hard although I guess Paul was an example of that too. Except he is the least likeable of all the disciples in my books- a misogynist and anti semite. Even Peter didn’t understand him – yet Paul wrote most of the letters in the New Testament. but then those were the days of the “fathers” of the church- women need not apply.
Bruce Davis may be sincere of course. Then he should take his medicine like a man if he is rejected and understand why people don’t want him out on the street and accept it.
Bruce Davis seems to me the most low-key in the bunch. Compared to the others (unless I’ve missed something) he’s done the least number of interviews, never wrote a book, has given his testimony as a Christian in some limited venues, and looks to have kept his head down and done his time with little incident. I’m not OK with any of them being released, and I would not like to see that precedent set. But if I had to choose I think he’d be my choice.
EMH absolutely agree with the fact that Leslie and Bruce are basically political prisoners at this point. I know many on this thread don’t care really about that because they are inside for murder. Whether its murder or not, its become more than just justice, its a political game.
Lee says:
Political prisoners? No, murders. Plain & simple….
Murderers, yes. But to some extent Bruce and Leslie can qualify as political prisoners. It depends on whose definition one is using. For example, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has, as part of its definition “if, for political motives, he or she is detained in a discriminatory manner as compared to other persons” and as a number of people on these pages who support continued incarceration have stated, no Guv’nor is going to risk wrecking their continued reputation and votes by releasing a Manson killer, regardless of what they do or have done in half a century. That means that to some extent, politics is a motivation in what keeps some of them incarcerated, which makes them, to some extent at least, political prisoners.
Cybele Moon says:
well, I can’t argue with anyone’s religious belief
I can !
I can only say a lot of people “find the Lord” in prison but it would be interesting to see if that carries on once they are released
A lot of people find the Lord outside of prison, go on with him for a while and then jump ship/fall away. It’s actually got little to do with prison. Christ categorized 4 groupings of people in relation to him. 3 groups become Christians. Of the three, 2 don’t carry on for various reasons. Only one group endures to the end. He wasn’t specifying gender, race or social class or status. I have no doubt whatsoever that if Bruce Davis at the age of 78 came out of prison, he would carry on with Christ. That may have been more in doubt if he had come out of prison say, in 1981 or even 1991. But I could say that about myself or anyone that has had their life turned around by Christ. Of course it is also possible that after 50 years one could abandon the Lord. That happens too. It’s down to each individual to ensure it doesn’t happen to them. I’ve been with the Lord since 1985. It could happen to me but if it did it would be because that is what I choose and I’m daily making sure that does not happen to me !
But it could. No one knows tomorrow.
I don’t think God transforms our lives – only we can do that if we want it badly enough
Well, I have to disagree with you there. Yes, we must be up for being transformed, but make no mistake about it ~ a real life, real living relationship lived every day with God demands internal transformation that cannot happen without him. I don’t like clever, cute, convenient soundbites but I have to say, the best treatise on “willpower” I’ve ever heard is this, in relation to God: we supply the will, he supplies the power. Having the will isn’t enough, as we see every January 1st !
We are all human and imperfect
Which is precisely why we need to be transformed from within by God.
Some of us need ongoing therapy too
I agree. In a way, that is what God’s church provides. People loving people, people going out of their way to help restore those in need of it, even if it takes years. People passing on what God is doing with them and extending that to others. Does it always happen ? Unfortunately no. But I’m not going to focus for now on those not doing it, but those that are doing it.
Being in Christ does not mandate that one needs no therapy. And someone coming out of prison after nearly 50 years may well need some therapy. There again, they may not.
Cybele Moon says:
as for Susan Atkins, if there were any of them to feel sorry for, compared to the other girls she had experiences a very dysfunctional early life
By the standards and expectations of American 1950s and 60s life, a number of the women in the Family experienced serious dysfunction in their early lives. Divorces, abandonment and abortions were not viewed as normal like they are now among a huge number of the population. That was the dysfunction of the day. Children didn’t go around broadcasting that their parents were divorced or that they were pregnant or that they’d been thrown out of the house.
Even as a Christian I believe she was so messed up mentally that no one could say for sure if she would be ok once released for all her claiming Christ as her lord and saviour
I agree.
Everyone is different. Some people come to Christ and the stuff that God has to work on transforming may be deep but not as deep and far reaching as others. In a way it’s not that different to children, even children in the same family, and their rate of development.
And the thing is, a Christian does not become perfect overnight. It’s a battle all the way, even if you’re not Susan Atkins, even if you’ve not been sexually abused by your brother and his friends, even if your Mum hasn’t died when you’re a naive teen, even if you’re Dad isn’t a boozer, even if you’re not left to look after your little brother when you’re barely a child yourself, even if the rest of your family doesn’t reject you or not look after you…….
A believer might be clinging onto many negative aspects of their old life. God may want to deal with things but even he can’t, despite his almightiness, if one too doesn’t want to play ball. Susan displayed a lot of the negative aspects of the believer struggling to truly let it all go but the reality is that she’s no different to any of us. I’ve struggled to let things go in order to cede control to God and be transformed and in my 36 years as a Christian I don’t honestly know a single person that hasn’t.
For some reason many people find that very distasteful, people who held human life in such disregard now suddenly Children of God
Personally, I think that’s, to put it kindly, naive. What is so distasteful about a murderer realizing they were wrong ? Susan Atkins isn’t Jesus. Susan Atkins wasn’t God. She didn’t dictate the terms of the agreement, she merely accepted them. It took courage to come out in front of the world and say “I was wrong and you whom I’ve long despised were actually right. Please help me.”
It comes down to a simple equation for me. Are we going to exhibit the necessary maturity to acknowledge that a person can be different to how they were yesterday ? This is nothing to do with parole. I would not have released Susan Atkins at any point before she died in 2009. But that is independent of what God may have been doing within her being. Those that come out and rail against the murderers that have seen the error of their ways, accepted God’s call and are trying to exist in prison as followers of Christ really need to examine themselves.
Most probably won’t though.
Paul was an example of that too. Except he is the least likeable of all the disciples in my books- a misogynist and anti semite
To take that in two stages, firstly, he could not be an anti-Semite. He just couldn’t be because he was Jewish. And as his letter to the Romans makes abundantly clear, he loved his people with a passion that makes one’s hair curl and one’s feet tingle. That he was honest about the shortcomings and flaws of the Jewish people of his time and prior is absolutely no different to the way Moses, the writer of Judges, Chronicles and Kings, and the entirety of the prophets ~and Jesus~ were. They {and the God inspiring them} pulled no punches when it came to “telling the Israelites about themselves,” calling a spade a spade.
As for misogyny, that, on the surface, looks a lot easier to substantiate.
But it’s equally untrue. Paul was a revolutionary even beyond the feminists of the 20th & 21st centuries. He really is a misunderstood character and that has to do with both translation bias and translation error. Granted, he had his faults as do we all and he wasn’t superman. He could be kind of intense. But the way he pitched for equality within Godly congregations and in the household was both at a variance with his own Jewish culture and that of the Greek/Roman cities he founded churches in. It was also at a variance with the female dominated Artemis cults of his time. Some of the things attributed to him are not so and if you are really interested in the subject {I don’t blame you if you’re not but you did bring him up} I wholeheartedly recommend a short book “What’s up with Paul and women ?” by a writer called John Zens. Honestly, Paul is at the complete other end of the spectrum to Charles Manson and the male members of the Family !! I could talk about this for ages but that would be so off topic that CieloDrive.com would probably have me deported ~ and rightly so ! Suffice it to say, I find as much misunderstanding regarding Paul as I find from many contributors regarding the various facets of this case. I’m aware that sounds terribly arrogant and it’s not meant to be, but I know what I mean.
Even Peter didn’t understand him
Pete was a fisherman that didn’t even check out whether aspects of the law he espoused to be following were even part of the law ! That said, his character arc through the new testament is far and away the most pronounced.
yet Paul wrote most of the letters in the New Testament
Well, yes. I’d say it was more accurate to say that his, in the main, are the letters that have survived. The new testament does not tell us about the majority of Jesus’ 12. We’ve no idea what happened to Simon the radical zealot, the other Judas, Matthew, Bartholomew, Thomas, Phillip, Andrew or Nathaniel. All we hear about is Peter and John ~ and John barely rates a passing mention. We know his brother James got his head cut off. Tradition paints various pictures but to me tradition is rather like gossip ~ not to be trusted because it can’t be verified. A bit like much of the stuff certain members of the Manson troupe trotted out, actually.
but then those were the days of the “fathers” of the church – women need not apply
Actually, the days of the church fathers came about well after those first century apostles had died and all kinds of extra-biblical shit that was culturally mandated had crept into the church and would go on to do 20 centuries worth of incalculable damage.
Bruce Davis….should take his medicine like a man if he is rejected and understand why people don’t want him out on the street and accept it
I suspect that the overwhelming majority of people currently breathing in the United States of America, even in California, haven’t got the slightest clue who Bruce Davis is. Even with a lot of aficionados of the case, there’s often a sort of hierarchy of interest and Bruce, I suspect, is well ensconced at the bottom of most of our lists. I think that much of the anti-Bruce feeling has nothing to do with him at all, but is to do with Charles Manson and Bruce being connected with him leaves him in that slipstream.
If one actually, in the cold hard light of day, examines what he actually did and then applied that to someone they love, like a son, daughter or sister or brother or best bud or Dad or Mum, let me just leave it at “I don’t think they’d be happy that said person be in prison after 49 years.”
Fred,
always interesting. As you imply, there is God’s law and there is man’s law.
Actually there are some families that do disown their relatives or children.
But whether or not their relative is in prison, at least they get to visit them living as opposed to a gravestone.
On the other hand I do feel badly for relatives of people who have done crimes such as the Manson family. What a legacy! Forgiveness or not no one can ever actually “forget” such crimes. In truth it’s hard to imagine what it must be like to be in their shoes (the murderers especially) but yes, forgiveness is a powerful thing.
Unlike most of the “born again”, I can’t look at someone like Bruce Davis or Tex Watson who are very vocal about their Christianity and shout Hallelujah. I’ve never been “born again” I’ve carried the same beliefs since childhood with a few modifications (lol) ever since I saw the film “Galileo’s Sons.”
(Apart from that I don’t think Krenwinkel or Van Houten have claimed to be born again but I could be wrong.)
I’m more inclined to shout “Hallelujah” over remorse and maturity than I am over a conversion. In 1976 Susan Atkins, a new Christian at the time, did an interview in which she explained her recent born-again experience, and recounted the murders on Cielo in vivid detail. I don’t doubt the validity of her faith, but in this interview she expressed no remorse over the agony she had put her victims and their families through, and when asked what she would say to these families, the best she could come up with was “I love them.”
Years later, during parole hearings, she sounded much more “human” to me as she wept over what she had done and said there were no words to express her pain and sorrow for the families and victims. That carried a lot more weight with me than the religious talk, however sincere it may have been.
I think that has more to do with growing emotionally than with religion, as Pat and Leslie seem to have done with no religious profession attached. In other words, if someone claims they’ve come to Christ, I can believe it. But that can neither make up for nor replace the hard work of facing the crime and taking responsibility for it.
PS:
Fred, by the way,
Bruce Davis was “involved” in two murders and possibly three. He is not just in the Manson slipstream.
Michael,
well said.
Michael says:
I’m more inclined to shout “Hallelujah” over remorse and maturity than I am over a conversion
If the person demonstrating the remorse and maturity has come to Christ, then I’m right there with you on that one.
Conversions in themselves mean little to me because conversion is only the start of the life that has to be lived and maintained and frequently tested.
Which is not to say that someone like Leslie who shows remorse and maturity but isn’t in Christ is somehow a lesser being or that their remorse and maturity somehow doesn’t cut the mustard the way a Christian’s would. They’re actually two separate topics for me, with much in the way of nuance.
That’s not how it works. If it did we would have prisons in every town full of murderers. Our prison system works on rehabilitation and punishment. So if the parole board says someone’s eligible that should be the end of it.
We don’t get to see all the files they see. They know best. If they were being careless Bruce would have been out years ago. I believe the parole board has done their job.
I’m a social worker and worked in the prison system for years. I worked with a famous Munchausen mom that killed two of her children. I recommended her release after years of work. Of course with the understanding she cannot be around minor children ever. She’s out and doing very well.
My point is, we cannot allow emotion to rule in this area. Professionals are well trained to work with prisoners. After eight years of studies, I knew what I was doing. Having a PhD behind my name didn’t just happen.
Bruce and LVH should be out by now and possibly Bobby. I haven’t really researched his time in prison. My thoughts on Krenwinkle and Watson, I admit are based on fear. However I know that’s not fair.
Had these people not killed someone famous, none of us today would even be talking about this. Imagine if they only killed the LaBiancas, they weren’t famous and even today get referred to under the Tate killings. Both Leno and Rosemary are always a second thought. Another part of it is, the Tate family kept this alive, understandably so. But after so many years, the emotion they bring to the hearings needs to end.
EMH, Yes, yes, this was a famous case with huge shock value, and social implications given the time frame of the sixties- young former middle class girls savagely murdering strangers in the era of peace and love etc etc.
At their ages now, they really have literally served life sentences if we consider the average life span give or take a few years 78-81. It’s hard to imagine stepping out of the time warp of the sixties into the world of today. I would imagine prison life is pretty limited in that respect and they have been there 50 years. If you are 40 or 50 yrs old, getting out of prison there might be more time to adjust. I don’t think it will be easy for them either way.
She lives while 100,000 of thousands died of COVID Killer Homecoming Queen
Evil
Many find religion “in a fox hole” or in prison, that is not uncommon. That usually lasts until their military discharge or release from prison. That said, I am not questioning the epiphany of Bruce. However, there are other Family related crimes in which he was implicated, eg Zero to which he has been evasive to questioning. The ranch hands have repeatedly said over the years that Bruce Davis was the one they most feared, the one who truly saw himself as Manson’s second in command. At 78, leave him in that structured environment in which he seems to excel. He does not do well devoid the structure of an institution, people die, and don’t believe for one second a 78 year old is harmless. Let him live out his life in incarceration as a lay minister where he is happy.
I’m not in favor of parole for Davis or the others since I think their crimes warrant life sentences, but I’ll admit the law seems more on their side than mine.
But the professed faith of Bruce, the late Atkins, and Watson does seem sincere to me. It has lasted and seems to have influenced their actions. They’re still not perfect but we’re talking about decades (they all converted in the 1970’s) of ongoing profession of faith and behavior that seems essentially to conform to that profession. I’d say the same about Catherine Share, Barbara Hoyt, and Dianne Lake, all of whom have claimed conversion to Christianity and seem to be living it out. (This is all from a limited viewpoint, obviously.)
On this point I’ll give the devil his due. (ha!)
Dr Ken says:
don’t believe for one second a 78 year old is harmless
The issue isn’t whether or not a 78 year old is harmless ~ many are not.
The issue isn’t whether or not Bruce Davis has done well in a structured environment.
The issue is should he be paroled ? It doesn’t matter how old he is.
Personally, I have some issues with Bruce. But then, I have issues with me ! I have issues with everyone.
I do think he’s somewhat evasive on some matters but I was interested to see him being questioned about Zero and Doreen Gaul. That indicates to me that someone either on the panel or advising the parole board, has been perusing these Manson blogs and various articles. I’ve noticed in the last few hearings of Tex, Pat, Leslie and Bruce, little things coming up that indicate that their books and interviews and what others are saying about them have been coming up.
Be careful what you sign !
Here we go again, the same old handful of people making the same old arguments over and over again on here. I doubt any of you even existed when these murders happened over 50 years ago. Let him go. He’s been approved by the board seven times. At 78, he’s not going to be a threat to society, and he won’t live much longer anyway. Free up the cell for somebody more dangerous. Dissenters, go ahead and hate me. I don’t give a damn.
I guess they should free the cell for you with that mentality that’s were you belong and sorry to say this no one hates you cause you’re not even worth that.
Christina, apparently you think I’m worth responding to with your nonsense.
Obviously you did otherwise you would have ignore my comments.
Sunny says:
Here we go again, the same old handful of people making the same old arguments over and over again on here
So, what do you suggest, Sunny ? What you are in effect implying is that people should not have the freedom to speak and discuss, on a public forum, even if it’s the same old arguments.
And yes, I’m saying it ~ they would have loved you in Nazi Germany and Stalin’s USSR.
If you think that was below the belt, think again. It’s the logical destination of the road your complaints are on.
I doubt any of you even existed when these murders happened over 50 years ago
That was rather ignorant of you, mate. If you have been paying attention to the same handful of people making the same old arguments, you’d at least recall that a number of us have stated our ages and that we were more than existing when these murders happened. I even say it in my first post here.
Be careful what you doubt in public, friend.
I just read that California is set to release 60,000+ repeat violent offenders, but ah hey as long as Bruce Davis is still in custody America is safe. I’ve read a lot serious type comments here so I thought I’d lighten it up by asking has anyone ever started a death pool on the “robots” who are currently incarcerated? I’ll list who I think will go first and so on 1. Bruce Davis 2. Bobby Beausoleil 3. Patricia Kernwinkel 4. Tex Watson 5. Leslie Van Houten.
Krenwinkel should be freed. She is the most remorseful.
Alexander, I think Leslie and Charles Watson have expressed remorse as strongly and consistently as Patricia has. I don’t see much difference between her statements of sorrow and apology and those of Watson and Van Houten.
Bobby has always seemed more evasive and shallow in his expressions, and Davis someone I haven’t followed as closely, so I don’t know what he has or hasn’t said by way of remorse.
Anyway, just curious. How do you feel Patricia has shown more remorse than the others?
She just seems more sincere in interviews to me. Leslie is remorseful but I feel is a bit less just because she is frustrated over essentially being a political prisoner. And Watson blames Manson too much in my opinion and has hidden facts about the case in regards to why he actually participated. Bobby is more defensive and Bruce is somewhere in between but overall sorry.
Patricia does come across with sincerity and acknowledges how monstrous her actions were, and how cowardly she was to go along with Manson. (Her words) I appreciate that.
I was disgusted, though, when she told a parole board that of all the people she let down, she herself was at the top of the list. She walked that back later, but it was an awfully stupid thing to say. It sounded at face value like she was placing the harm she did to herself above the harm she did to others.
I completely agree with you about Bobby, who I think comes across pretty badly. And yes, giving it some thought, I would agree that of all of them, Patricia does seem the most remorseful, with Leslie running a close second.
That all said though, it’s quite difficult to communicate remorse to the satisfaction of all because remorse is primarily connected to the person feeling it. Now, the truth is that we all communicate in different ways. Just because I cry in my pronouncements of remorse doesn’t mean I am actually more remorseful than someone who just states it in a matter-of-fact way or who may nervously laugh or grin at points and who may not come across as remorseful.
When Pat said the person she most harmed was herself, on the one hand it seems like a crass thing to say. But if one observes nuances and is able to divide their own bias from the intricacies of what someone else is getting at, then one can see her point. In a very real way, the person whose life was most wrecked by the Tate/LaBianca murders was her own.
She helped end the life of the victims so realistically, they are not even part of the equation. The family members and friends {we always overlook close friends, who can be even more important to the victim than their actual family} of the victims, as horrendously as the events impacted them, ultimately hold the choice as to how far they allow {yes, allow} those events to impede them as the future becomes the present. It obviously does not seem like pretty reading at first but once one gets beyond their own feelings, it is hard to justifiably keep saying that a particular event has caused one to not keep moving forward. Same with the families of the murderers.
So with that in mind, Pat was pointing out something really important. That despite the part Charlie Manson played in her eventual downfall, despite all the other things we so readily run to blame for our present positions, whatever they may be, the person most harmed by her own actions was her.
It’s not something many people will countenance but I get where she was coming from. Perhaps her mistake was in saying it when she said it. If she had been on parole and 15 or 20 years had elapsed and she’d kept her nose clean, I doubt many would take it in the same way.
Fred, I think it was a pretty terrible thing to say regardless of the time frame. But I do get where she was coming from, especially putting this one poorly-put statement in context alongside her many other statements of remorse, most of which I think are well put and come across as authentic. (Can’t read minds, just words and actions)
Even more important to me is her behavioral record, which is pretty darned good. As much as I oppose release for any of them, I would put my money on Patricia and Leslie if I had to gamble on sincerity.
Michael:
It is true what you said. Rehabilitation and remorse of or by a murderer cannot be articulated as statements of facts. They have to be taken on trust or on faith. So when Davis, or Krenwinkel or Van Houten say what he/she did was bad but is now a better person, he/she is asking the people of California to trust what is said or have faith in what is said is true. The issue is they are incarcerated not for who they are but what they did. Looked at in one way retribution and rehabilitation are exclusive of one another.
Why do the governors have the final say? This case is so toxic (just the name Manson) that there is no way a governor can be objective and not consider the political implications of releasing a member of ‘the family”.
To Sunny, I am 73 years old. My family lived less than 25 miles from the ranch where the family lived. The women hung out at a trash bin behind a store where my brother-in-law worked. My 2 brothers went to the ranch one day to look at the wrecked autos and were run off by Watson and Manson, not knowing who they were until they were arrested months later. One of my brother-in-law’s worked as a correctional officer where Davis and Watson were incarcerated. Yet none of us were alive during the crimes? Surely you jest. I guess to you 50 years incarceration is just way too much. Tell me, how much is enough? They were all given the death penalty which was over turned to life with the possibility of parole…not a guarantee of parole. Everyone has their right to voice their opinions, even you. But most of the people speaking out here seem to know more about those monsters than you. And for those who talk about forgiveness and religion…you have the right to your opinions too. I still say, they all should not be released until they die!
Rosie:
BRAVO!! incarcerated till they die not even their religion, faith and remorse have been good enough for freedom and of course they all have been good what else can they do knowing
they aren’t going nowhere.
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